Railway hopper cars with one or more hoppers are used for transporting commodities such as dry bulk. For example, hopper cars are frequently used to transport coal, sand, metal ores, ballast, aggregates, grain, and any other type of lading material. Commodities are discharged from openings typically located at or near the bottom of a hopper. Existing systems use a door or gate assembly to open and close discharge openings of a hopper. Existing gate assemblies use gates that can only be configured in a fully open or fully closed position and cannot be configured with an attenuated flowrate. The system receiving the unloaded commodity may become overwhelmed by too much product being discharged at once when the flowrate is too great. Thus, it is desirable to provide more flexibility and options when discharging commodities.